Democrats Are Winning the Early Vote. But What Does That Really Tell Us About the 2026 Midterms?

The important thing is to separate who is winning the early-vote participation battle from who is actually winning votes, because the ballots have not been counted by candidate. With that distinction firmly in place, the numbers available on October 28 show a Democratic early-voting advantage that is not unusual in direction, but is unusually large in magnitude, even compared with the 2022 midterms.

With Election Day approaching, more than 33 million Americans have already cast ballots in the 2026 midterm elections, and the emerging early-vote picture contains some potentially significant warning signs for Republicans.

As of October 28, 33,014,823 early ballots had been cast across 46 reporting states, according to a national tracker using state election-office data. Roughly 16.7 million were returned mail ballots and another 16.3 million were cast through early in-person voting.

The headline, however, is the partisan composition.

Among states that actually publish party registration, registered Democrats account for 42.5% of ballots cast, compared with 31.8% for registered Republicans. A broader model covering states without party-registration data estimates the national early electorate at 44.1% Democratic, 32.0% Republican and 23.9% independent or other.

That modeled advantage works out to approximately D+12.1. So, yes: Democrats are clearly ahead in the early-voting participation battle.

But that requires an important qualification. These figures identify voters by registration or model their likely party affiliation. They do not reveal whom those voters actually selected on their ballots. A registered Democrat can vote Republican, a registered Republican can vote Democratic, and unaffiliated voters can break heavily toward either party.

Democratic Early-Vote Advantages Are Nothing New

A Democratic advantage before Election Day is not itself surprising.

Since 2020, Democrats have been considerably more inclined than Republicans to vote by mail, according to an NBC News Decision Desk analysis of early voting. That created increasingly recognizable partisan differences between mail, early and Election Day voting.

Republicans, meanwhile, have traditionally been more reliant upon Election Day turnout. One analysis of the 2026 numbers similarly notes that Democrats historically outperform Republicans in early voting. Consequently, Republicans do not need to lead the national early vote to ultimately win the election.

The more interesting question is whether Republicans are sufficiently close to their normal early-voting performance to make up the difference on Election Day. And here the 2026 numbers become more intriguing.

The On Point Politics Early Vote Tracker models the early electorate at the equivalent of D+12.1, compared with D+10.3 at the equivalent point in the 2022 midterms. In other words, the current electorate is approximately 1.8 percentage points more Democratic than the comparable 2022 early electorate.

That’s a much more meaningful comparison than presidential-year 2024, when the equivalent early electorate was only D+2.1. The 2026 electorate currently stands 9.9 points bluer than the comparable point in 2024, although presidential and midterm elections involve very different turnout environments.

The Battleground Map Is Where Things Get Interesting

The raw state numbers make clear why neither party can simply look at the national D+12 figure and declare victory.

Texas has already produced approximately 5.11 million early ballots, the largest number in the country, with the electorate modeled at R+8.0. Florida follows with 3.51 million and an electorate around R+1.0. But several other important states look dramatically different.

North Carolina has approximately 1.96 million ballots cast, with an estimated D+15.6 composition. Georgia has approximately 1.78 million at D+8.5. California stands at 3.42 million and D+31.5, while Washington is at 1.20 million and D+47.3. Again, those margins cannot simply be converted into projected election results.

In fact, the tracker itself illustrates the problem beautifully: it rates some races in states with Democratic-looking early electorates as nevertheless favoring Republicans when historical turnout patterns and necessary benchmarks are incorporated. It currently describes the early-vote signal for the Georgia governor’s race as “Slight R,” for example, despite Georgia’s overall early electorate being modeled at D+8.5. That distinction is critical.

Something Else Is Changing: How Democrats Vote

There’s another wrinkle that could make interpreting 2026 harder than previous elections. An October NBC News Decision Desk analysis found that Democrats were requesting fewer mail ballots than in previous elections while returning the ballots they did request more quickly. NBC said the pattern could mean some Democratic voters are shifting away from mail voting toward early in-person voting.

If so, some of the traditional assumptions about when Democratic votes arrive could be changing. NBC specifically cautioned that changing voting habits may make it more difficult to use early-voting figures as a measure of partisan enthusiasm. That’s an enormous caveat when evaluating 2026.

So Who Is Actually Ahead?

The most defensible answer is: Democrats are ahead in the early-vote participation battle, and by a somewhat larger margin than at the equivalent point in the 2022 midterms. Republicans, however, have not necessarily lost the election because Republicans have traditionally been more dependent upon Election Day voting.

What Republicans should find concerning isn’t simply that Democrats are leading early. They’re supposed to. It’s that the modeled Democratic advantage is currently D+12.1 versus D+10.3 at the comparable point in 2022, while nationwide early turnout is running approximately 4% ahead of the 2022 pace.

That suggests Democrats are not merely banking the predictable early-vote advantage. At this stage, their relative position is modestly stronger than in the last midterm cycle. Still, early voting cannot tell us whether we’re watching new Democratic voters entering the electorate or merely Democrats who would otherwise have voted on Election Day casting their ballots earlier. That difference will be crucial.

The early vote therefore isn’t a prediction of the final result. Think of it instead as the opening score before Election Day. And right now, Democrats have put more points on the board than Republicans.

The unanswered question is whether Republicans are holding millions of their votes in reserve for Election Day, as they traditionally have, or whether the Democratic early-voting advantage is revealing a genuine enthusiasm and turnout gap that Republicans will struggle to overcome.

As of October 28, the early-vote evidence points more favorably toward Democrats than Republicans. But Election Day remains the ultimate test.

Sources:

NBC News Decision Desk, NBC News 2026 Election, and On Point Politics 2026 Early Vote Tracker. [nbcnews.com], [nbcnews.com], [onpointpolitics.us]

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